Digital cellular networks, such as the Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) support billions of subscribers worldwide. In such networks, entities are often configured to communicate using modulated radio signals according to a given protocol. A sender that needs to communicate a sequence of bits would create a radio signal (e.g., RF signal) and modulate that signal according to a given modulation protocol. For example, GSM uses a Gaussian minimum shift keying (GMSK) modulation protocol where the phase of the signal is shifted at different times, such that shifts by different amounts indicate given bits. A receiver in such a system receives the RF signal and demodulates it to determine the intended sequence of bits based on the sequence of shifts in the signal.
One of the most important characteristics of a receiver is its sensitivity. Sensitivity refers to the smallest power level of an input signal at which the receiver can still detect and decode the signal correctly (i.e. within a bounded bit error rate (BER)). More sensitive receivers may achieve a higher transfer quality while less sensitive receivers may experience call quality degradation, handover failure, call drop, and/or other problems. Accordingly, there is a need for new ways to produce highly sensitive receivers.